Hi this is my first post here but I have read quite a few articles on this site prior to acquiring my chow chow puppy. I just had a few questions about how to properly introduce her into our home. Currently, we have a 2 year old male shih tzu who is (99%) housebroken. He is generally friendly and loves attention, especially from my wife. He is not fixed. The 'new girl' is a 3 month old female chow chow. We also have a male cat that is the same age as our shih tzu. My questions mostly revolve around how to make sure our shih tzu and the new addition to the family have the best possible conditions to form a positive relationship. Some of my questions are -

Is there anything as far as exercises or something I can do with the pups to get them to interact better?

Should I be worried about my shih tzu becoming depressed? Or how can I avoid this happening?

Is there anyway to assert our shih tzu as the 'alpha'? Such as try to show the new pup that "Hey hes smaller but he has been here longer and you will respect him."

I'm sure I'll have more and I'm sorry for coming off as ignorant. I just want to try to be a more responsible pet owner, as well as ensure my animals are all happy and healthy.

Just by virtue of the fact your Shih Tzu is not fixed, you are asking for problems later on down the road.

If anyone in the household is going to be "alpha" in your home, it should be should be yourself and not any dog.Just because the Shih Tzu's been there longer, or is smaller or bigger doesn't merit him to be a pack leader. It takes leadership qualities to be a leader, and the dog has to have a natural, balanced ability to do so, irregardless of how long they've been there or what they look like.

The world "alpha" has been blown so out of context amongst dog owners it's not funny any more.What you're looking to cultivate in your home is a respectful, caring relationship with your dogs and not an adversarial one and this is generally achieved through continuing education, stability, fairness and consistent proper handling.

What you can do to keep both balanced is to make sure you put very good obedience training on both of them, and preferably at the same time and if you don't know how to do this on your own, subscribe to an obedience school in your area. If you really want to be a responsible companion animal owner as you say, please make sure both your pets are sterilized.